A one-time showing of the documentary "Bag It" to kick off a plastic pollution awareness campaign. It is an initiative of a newly formed group, Cape Environmental Action.

7 p.m. March 6...

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Bag it

A one-time showing of the documentary "Bag It" to kick off a plastic pollution awareness campaign. It is an initiative of a newly formed group, Cape Environmental Action.

7 p.m. March 6

Cape Cinema, 35 Hope Lane, East Dennis.

Free but requesting a $5 donation.

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It's everywhere — in our computers, TVs, and phones.

It wraps our food, carries our water, envelopes our clothes.

In fact, there's so much of this mostly man-made carbon-containing compound in the environment, gobs of it has been found floating in the ocean, leading Marine Biological Laboratory scientist Linda Amaral-Zettler to coin the term "plastisphere."

And because this stuff doesn't easily decay, it's going to be here for a long, long, looooong time.

That's why Marstons Mills resident Sheila Place is under no illusions in taking on this revolutionary, lightweight, strong, flexible product we all know as plastic.

Still, while Place understands that ridding the world of fossil fuel-based plastic isn't on the horizon, she doesn't see any reason why we can't reduce how much we use — one grocery bag at a time.

Her interest in environmentalism was sparked by the work of George Woodwell, founder and former director of the Woods Hole Research Center, so Place joined the Green Sanctuary Committee at the Unitarian Church of Barnstable. That's where she met Steve Thomas.

"He moved here from Maine a couple of years ago and joined the sanctuary committee. He mentioned doing something about plastic bags. He said here's what we did in Kennebunk and here's how we did it. And in Kennebunk they were able to reduce the use of plastic bags by 40 percent," Place told me as we sat in her dining room.

The green sanctuary committee liked the idea so much they contacted the Unitarian Churches in Brewster and Falmouth, which led to the formation of an ad hoc group called Cape Environmental Action (CEA).

The group contacted local Stop & Shop stores and convinced store managers at six different locations to allow them to set up a table inside the store on Saturdays in March and April to help raise awareness about plastic bag pollution.

The grocery giant also agreed to donate reuseable bags for CEA to distribute to any shopper willing to "get drastic and reduce plastic."

"Who knows where this will go. We would like to see this as a grass-roots thing that grows," Place said. "At a minimum we'll get reuseable bags in people's hands and give them some literature. This is really about education and awareness."

And to further spread awareness, besides offering reuseable bags at Stop & Shop, the group is sponsoring a showing of the documentary "Bag It" at 7 p.m. tonight at the Cape Cinema in Dennis.

"It's informative and entertaining. It's not too long and it carries a lot of information so that you really get a perspective on not just plastic bags but plastic in every walk of life — the environmental damage it does and the toll it takes everywhere," Place said of the film.

Amaral-Zettler isn't affiliated with Place or her church. But, as a marine microbial ecologist, she likes the idea.

In collaboration with scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and the Sea Education Association in Woods Hole, Amaral-Zettler has been studying the multitude of microbes colonizing flecks of plastic in the ocean.

"We think most of it comes from the land," Amaral-Zettler said, explaining how her and her colleagues have found microbes taking up residence in the floating "plastisphere."

"The biggest impacts involve (marine animals') ingestion of these plastic materials. And, there is evidence that some sea birds are actively seeking it out and eating it. It's kind of alarming," she said.

While there's much to learn about how these pervasive polymers are effecting marine ecology, Amaral-Zettler said, there's no question that fossil fuel-based plastics have "a large carbon footprint."

"Plastic shopping bags are mostly made out of high- and low-density polyethylene. And typically, it's a single-use product. Yes, some people reuse plastic bags, which is great, but they mostly go in the trash and that ends up in landfills or in our oceans. Less than 25 percent of recyclable plastic actually gets recycled," Amaral Zettler said, which is why she is a big fan of not using plastic bags, if it can be avoided.

"Reducing our use of single-use plastic is a very worthy cause," she said. "It may seem trivial but it will make in impact if more and more people adopt that philosophy. It seems like a pretty reasonable thing to take on."

Considering that plastic bags make up 10 percent of the washed-up debris polluting our coastlines; that the average life span of a plastic bag is 700 to 1,000 years; that in the United States alone we go through 60,000 single-use plastic bags every five seconds and that about 12 million barrels of oil are needed to meet our annual plastic bag demand, Place said this is her way of following Ghandi's example: "Be the change you want to see in the world."

She realizes that most of us have been indoctrinated to think of consumption strictly in terms of product and price, without ever thinking about the process behind it. Still, the simple act of avoiding plastic bags is the least she can do.

"As a grandmother," she said, "I ask myself: what's the world going to look like when my grandkids are my age?"

Sean Gonsalves can be reached at sgonsalves@capecodonline.com. Follow Sean Gonsalves on Twitter @SeanGonCCT.